


It's Between You and Me (and All Our Ghosts)

by alyyks



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Feelings, Hot Springs & Onsen, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Mentioned Allura (Voltron), Mentioned Keith (Voltron), Mentioned Lance (Voltron), Mentioned Pidge | Katie Holt, Mentions of Shiro's Illness (Voltron), Nightmares, Not Voltron: Legendary Defender Season/Series 08 Compliant, POV Hunk (Voltron), Past Curtis/Shiro (Voltron), Post-Voltron: Legendary Defender, Rare Pairings, Shiro (Voltron) Backstory, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, friends to boyfriends, mutual crushing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:34:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22402663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alyyks/pseuds/alyyks
Summary: “Ok. Ok. You need a break.” Shiro opened his mouth to protest, and Hunk kept going, “No, don’t try to find an excuse. We’re done with the talks, the final paperwork can be done by someone else, you have far too much leave time accumulated that you never use. What do you, Shiro —not Captain Shirogane of the Atlas, not Takashi Shirogane face of the Coalition, not Shiro pilot of the Black Lion, just Shiro— want to do right now?”Shiro opened his mouth, closed it. He turned his head a bit, eyes looking in the distance, past the observation bay and the stars beyond.----or, the one in which Hunk and Shiro take a trip on Earth.
Relationships: Hunk/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 38





	It's Between You and Me (and All Our Ghosts)

**Author's Note:**

> A tons of thanks to my beta and enabler extraordinaire, antonomasia09. It started as a bit of a dare, now it's "Join me on this canoe!"
> 
> Minami is not intended to be a real place - any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual places is purely coincidental yadda yadda

By the end of the month-long series of galas, diners and talks on behalf of the Coalition, everyone on the Atlas was showing some signs of strain, even Hunk. They had all done incredible work—which he told his staff and friends in the kitchens every day—and he was very glad it was coming to an end.

Atlas was orbiting the planet where most of the talks for the sector had taken place. Hunk had heard its name but even the translators had had trouble coming up with something he could recognize and pronounce. It was a beautiful place, mainly blue and white seen from space, deceptively calm-looking.

Shiro was in the observation lounge as well.

Hunk took a few more steps in. He had told everyone in the kitchens to go and be done for the day, at which point Shay had laughed at him and sent him on his way with the last bottle of Klatch. It tasted a bit like lemonade and a bit like banana bread, wasn’t quite hard enough to really hit Humans, and it had been a success at the galas.

It had looked like Shiro hadn’t had a minute to himself in that month. With Allura gone—and Hunk’s heart squeezed painfully at the reminder, even after years, for the loss of his friend—and the Lions gone, the face of the Coalition was Shiro and Shiro alone. He had taken on the responsibility and burden with the same incredible and awe-inspiring steadiness he had taken on leading Voltron and then Atlas when it was the sole ship on Earth capable of hitting Sendak and his fleet back. Hunk was there to support his friend—and he was there to see the strain. Had Shiro’s hair not already been entirely white for years, he would have probably been showing grey from the stress by now.

Hunk knocked on the back of the main couch—he always preferred to announce his presence when Shiro was alone. “Hey, I come bearing Klatch to share—or I can go if you prefer.”

Shiro raised his head. He gave Hunk a faint smile. “Take a seat and let me taste that, then.”

Hunk sat down next to him. “What, you haven’t had any yet?”

Shiro shook his head. “Too busy. Everyone raved about it.” He raised his eyes to Hunk’s. “Thanks. You and your team surpassed yourselves.”

“Aww,” Hunk said, “We did our work.”

“You did more than that and you know it.”

Hunk finally opened the bottle. “Once a leg, always a leg, you know?” He offered it to Shiro.

Shiro took a sip, hummed in appreciation, took a bigger sip and passed it to Hunk. They stayed like that for a while, passing the bottle back and forth, watching the planet below them, and the stars.

“You’ve been kinda quiet,” Hunk said. He didn’t want to say immediately that he had seen the strain, the circles under Shiro’s eyes, the tension in his voice during fraught talks—and that the talks might have been done, but the tension in Shiro’s back was still there.

Shiro didn’t glance at him, eyes on the stars. “I have been, haven’t I,” he trailed off.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Hunk checked the bottle, saw only one sip was left. He held it up to Shiro who shook his head.

Hunk finished the bottle, waited for Shiro. He’d wait as long as needed. He wasn’t Keith, with whom Shiro was a lot more open, a lot faster, more direct. They had a special bond, one that held fast even on opposite sides of the universe and with Voltron gone. He wasn’t Lance either, who would needle until something snapped, or would distract both of them into another conversation. Coran would either launch into a tall tale or be just as quiet as Shiro was. Pidge, bless her, wouldn’t know how to breach the subject and would not want to.

“I’m thirty,” Shiro said. His left hand was rubbing his right wrist, white and faintly shining from the light of his shoulder port.

Hunk waited.

“I thought I’d be dead by now,” Shiro said.

Hunk’s heart plummeted to the neighborhood of his feet. He could remember all too well entering the Black Lion and seeing only emptiness where Shiro should have been, Keith’s grief, the hole Shiro had left behind, the gauntness of the face of the man they all thought to be Shiro including the man himself, the husk of his body left without a mind before Allura transferred him back from the Lion, the weeks on their way back to Earth when Shiro was there with them again but confused and silent and hurting in a way none of them knew how to reach.

“You were,” he said, voice breaking in the middle.

Shiro looked up sharply, his body angled toward Hunk instead of the stars. “That’s— I’m sorry Hunk, that’s not quite what I meant, but you’re right.” He looked at the floor, voice going softer. “You’re right.”

Hunk cleared his throat. “What—“ he said, cleared his throat again. “What did you mean, then?”

Shiro’s left hand went back to his right wrist. “I was sick—my original body was sick. Thirty was the maximum even the more optimistic prognoses were giving me. And now I’m there and… I never really had a plan for this.”

Hunk tried to clear his throat, gave up, and croaked: “Unless you tell me stop, I’m going to hug you now.” He waited just enough, then wrapped his arms firmly around Shiro. Shiro, as was sadly still the case, stiffened for a few moments before leaning into the embrace. He had gotten better about touch when he and Curtis were together, but that relationship was long gone now. Hunk held Shiro, and tried to swallow back the tears, and mostly failed.

It wasn’t hard to feel Shiro’s body and its warmth under his uniform like this. For as long as Hunk had really known him, and not just as one of his Garrison instructors, Shiro had been made of muscles. There wasn’t much fat on him, not that anyone really knew how much his body had been modified and what was the line there between healthy and a problem. But one thing was for sure: Hunk wasn’t supposed to be able to count the knobs of Shiros’s spine through his jacket as he could now.

Shiro hadn’t had the time to try the Klatch. He probably hadn’t had the time to eat enough either and had replaced meals with protein shakes, as he did too often for Hunk’s taste.

Hunk took a long breath in through his nose then let Shiro go, keeping his hands on his arms—one warm, the other smooth metal. “Ok. Ok. You need a break.” Shiro opened his mouth to protest, and Hunk kept going, “No, don’t try to find an excuse. We’re done with the talks, the final paperwork can be done by someone else, the Atlas now allows other people to lead and fly, you have far too much leave time accumulated that you never use. What do you, Shiro —not Captain Shirogane of the Atlas, not Takashi Shirogane face of the Coalition, not Shiro pilot of the Black Lion, just Shiro— want to do right now?”

Shiro opened his mouth, closed it. He turned his head a bit, eyes looking in the distance, past the observation bay and the stars beyond.

Hunk waited, then continued in a soft voice. “Me, I’m easy. I could always go for going home and getting to make banana bread with my mom. Then working on a car with my dad. Then a long hike through the canyon behind Platt City.”

The silence was only broken by the sounds of their breathing.

“I think… I think I know,” Shiro said. He looked back at Hunk. “I want to go to Japan, to Minami.”

“Sounds good. Any reason why?”

Shiro smiled, and Hunk felt ready to cry. “That’s where my parents’ and grandfather’s grave is.”

+

“—no but Lance, you don’t understand, I offered to go with him!”

Lance, in the video, the light of the local sun shining all around him, tilted his head to the side. “Let me get back there from the start, big guy. You are done with the month-long boring and stressful Coalition thing—congrats on that bee-tee-dubs—you got some one on one time with Shiro—“

“La-aance!”

“—you tell me there was “some private stuff shared” and now you’re going on a trip with the man you’ve had a raging crush on for a good four years? What’s wrong in there?” Lance raised a finger. “Wait, no, don’t answer that, let me—“

Hunk’s cry of protest was ignored, and true to his sudden fears, the faces of Keith and Pidge joined Lance’s on the screen, each in a different environment. The fourth corner of the screen showed only a bright orange mustache.

The overlapped hellos and demands to know what was going on did not last long enough for Hunk to find a way to burrow through the floor of his bunk and disappear, alas.

“What did you call us all for?” Keith demanded.

“You make it sound like we never talk!” Lance protested.

“We never talk. One of you usually rambles endlessly.”

“I am on a schedule boys, subject please.”

“Hunk is moaning about his crush.”

The mustache never moved. “Number Two! Are you and Number One finally moving in a convergent path!”

“Oh.”

That last one was Keith’s voice. Hunk finally raised his head to look at the screen. Out of them all, it was Keith’s opinion he valued most on this topic—his opinion, and, in the best turn of events, his advice.

“Hi everyone. Lance, you suck.” He sighed. “One, I am not moaning, two, it’s not a crush—“

“More like pining and admiration and friendship all rolled up into one,” said Pidge.

“—not a crush, and three, during circumstances I will not expand on at this point, I kinda convinced Shiro to take a vacation.”

All noises from the screen ceased.

“I believe I need to check the nearest thermometer,” Pidge finally said, “Hell must be freezing over.”

“I’ve been trying since he and Curtis broke up,” Keith said. “How did you manage that?”

Hunk sighed. He was not telling them any of what Shiro had told him, none of the personal stuff. But he could say the rest, the public stuff. “It’s been a long month out there, and I think there’s been enough accumulated strain that even he figured out he needs a break.”

Keith frowned. “Is he okay? Are you?”

Hunk smiled. “Not enough sleep and too many official functions for everyone—I think he’s been running on protein shakes and sheer Shiro-ness.” That didn’t really answer Keith’s question, but he did not push.

“So vacation, huh,” Pidge said, like the gremlin she was, “Am I to understand vacation together?” Her eyebrows wiggled.

“Oh the glorious passions of youth, the fire, the ardour~”

“Guys none of us are that young anymore—“ but it was too late to quell the antics of Pidge and Coran, especially once Lance joined in.

Hunk sighed— and the moment after Pidge, Coran and Lance were muted, leaving only Keith and him on audio.

“Hunk,” Keith said, and they had known each other long enough for it to be a question in and of itself.

“He wants to go to Earth, to Japan. I offered to go with him, if he wanted company.”

Keith frowned, again. “Has he— he put on a good front the last time we talked, but that doesn’t mean much with him. He could be bleeding out and he’d still say he’s fine.”

“He’s. I think he’s going through some stuff and being the face of the Coalition doesn’t give much space to think about it—which I totally get.”

“… stuff like unexpected life?” Keith’s voice was very quiet.

Hunk straightened, looked away. If Keith spoke about it first, then it was ok, wasn’t it? “Yeah.”

Keith sighed. “Hunk, you’ve got to know—this is… huge. He never talks about it. Even before Kerberos, when it was every minute of his life, he never spoke about it, never complained.”

“What are you saying?”

“He talks about you, you know? He wouldn’t be out there if you weren’t there at his back.”

Hunk opened his mouth, closed it. The extent of the trust and confidence Shiro had in him was starting to dawn on him. Keith gave him half a smile. “Just, keep doing what you’re doing.”

+

Even after how long they had been away on Coalition matters, going back to Earth for leave wasn’t an overnight affair. Hunk put in his leave request, asked for Shiro to do the same, and then asked Shiro’s administrative assistant if Shiro had really done it. Shiro’s administrative assistant smiled with too many teeth and assured Hunk it was taken care of.

The Atlas was a big ship, but even such a big ship was too small sometimes. Everyone knew Shiro had put in a request for leave time, and nearly everyone was encouraging it and congratulating Hunk for it, in various ways, with various degrees of awkwardness involved on either side. Hunk was thankful that at least here nobody commented on his crush—it seemed he had managed to keep it under wraps but to his closest friends.

There was, however, the matter of the money and barter goods exchanged for bets Hunk didn’t really want to know the details of. Just knowing it involved Shiro and/or him made him squirm.

Shay raised the subject up in the kitchen four days after his conversation with Shiro, while she was neatly packing a series of shining stones she had been handed by one of the 2nd Gen MFE fighters’ mechanics with much grumbling. “Hunk, why did you not place your own bets?”

He looked at her over his simmering sauce—Klatch-based, with a nice roux to tie it up, as a sort of distantly-related space variation on welsh rarebit that he was trying out—and frowned. “What would I have bet on?”

“How long it would take Captain Shiro to take a break, or who would get him to do so, or—“

“—While totally gaming it, of course—“ Sal said in passing with an armful of fresh vegetables from the hydroponics.

“Lalalala, I can’t hear you all, lalalala!”

His friends and co-workers were the worst.

+

“Shiro!” was the first thing Hunk heard as he walked through the Atlas’ corridors to meet with Shiro and go on with their trip. Everything was in place: the ship was on Earth, Hunk had packed his good civies, Shiro was officially on leave and his bridge crew had forcibly ejected him off the bridge half an hour ago. The story of it had already made its round through the Atlas.

The person who had shouted Shiro’s name disappeared through the door of Shiro’s quarters. Hunk caught the end of a lab coat—Pidge it was. He hoisted his travel bag higher and knocked on the door left ajar.

“Great! Just the person I wanted to see!” Pidge said with undisguised enthusiasm, turning so that both Hunk and Shiro were in her field of vision. Shiro, standing next to her, still in his uniform, looked at him and smiled, gestured for him to come in.

The anteroom to Shiro’s quarters—because being a captain of a big ass ship warranted quarters with an anteroom-slash-meeting-space—were fairly bare. Hunk always felt a bit like he was walking in a movie set when coming there. Everything set in the open had a meaning, had been given to Shiro as face of the Coalition, as former paladin. It was a very political space, and not quite a comfortable one.

“Hey Pidge,” Hunk said, “What’s up?”

Pidge had a metal case at her feet, and an expression that could either lead to safe fun things such as robotics projects, or terrible fun things like explosions. Hunk loved a good explosion, but there was a time and place, and he was disinclined to think the beginning of their leave was one.

“Captain, my captain, fellow limb, let me present to you a little something as a vacation present,” Pidge said, and opened the case. In one half rested an arm, looking close to the one Shiro was wearing but for the matte black palm, the clear shoulder attachment, and the fact it wasn’t oversized or in two parts. The other half displayed an array of tools, that Hunk recognized as necessary to fit the arm and run diagnostics.

Pidge took the arm in both hands and held it to Shiro. Hunk resisted the urge to put his nose right on top of it and coo. “Lighter, allows you to wear whatever you want without special tailoring, has the bonus of making your identity slightly less obvious at first glance, can crush a brick to dust—and if you want it, well, you’re kinda my tester for a more widespread production on a similar line. There’s always a need for good prosthetics.”

Shiro was looking at the arm, his left hand at his right wrist again, right over the compartment under which Allura’s tiara’s jewel rested. 

Shiro had to have been silent a bit too long, a bit too tense. Pidge tilted her head to the side, hair brushing her shoulder. “Is something wrong?”

“It’s very thoughtful, Pidge. Thank you.”

“But?”

“I’ve gotten used to the one I have and—it still is Allura’s.”

The silence that floated was a familiar one. They missed her like missing a limb—and Hunk wanted to groan mentally at the unfortunate pun. Instead, he got closer to the arm Pidge was still holding.

“Do you mind?” At her head shake, he took it in both hands. It was quite light, felt sturdy—the palm material was soft and felt a bit like skin, certainly warmer than the metal alloys Shiro’s current arm was made of. The shoulder attach point was thinner than Shiro’s current one, and nothing looked like it would glow. While a good glow was always fun, no glowing also had its advantages. Hunk kept up a steady stream of appreciation, praise and babble, and soon enough he could see Shiro’s shoulders relaxing back to their usual tension. It still was too much stiffness and tension, but one step at a time.

“So how does it attach?” Hunk finished.

“Very easily!” Pidge replied, and she manipulated the arm in Hunk’s hand, shoulder point up, and both her and Shiro got closer. That Shiro was interested was a plus in Hunk’s book. The arm… to be honest, Shiro’s current arm gave him the creeps. It was a bit too close to Sendak’s for his peace of mind, too oversized—too big in a way he could see Shiro being lopsided when he was too tired to pay attention to his posture—too obviously alien. And Hunk knew it was something to work on, because the other arm had not given him that much of a problem even though he knew how Shiro had gotten it and how it had very obviously been a weapon.

“It goes over your shoulder in place of your current shoulder mount. There’s no surgery needed, no installation—the wrap sticks to your skin and underlaying muscle through molecular osmosis, and this baby takes advantage of the installation already present for all the sensory connection.”

Shiro’s shoulders had lowered another centimeter as soon as he heard there was no surgery needed.

“And… While you deserve a break, and to not have the Atlas connected to you 24/7, there is a place for Allura’s crystal. It won’t be the main power source, and it’s there just in case, but, here,” Pidge said, turning the arm over. Where the head of the humerus would have been, there was a small circular hatch hiding a mount just big enough to lock Allura’s crystal in place.

Shiro took the arm in his hands. Pidge and Hunk exchanged a glance of triumph.

“Yeah,” Shiro said. “I’ll try it."

The arm fit him like a glove. There were minimal adjustments and calibration needed, all the affair of half an hour—the biggest change seemed to be the sensitivity of his hand. Shiro didn’t seem to be able to stop himself from rubbing one hand with the other, seemingly fascinated with the textures. Pidge happily chatted about it and all the tech packed in. Hunk would have, in any other circumstances, babbled right back at her, but he didn’t seem to be able to take his eyes off of Shiro in the usual tank top he wore under his shirt and uniform jacket, and the years that seemed to be erased just by having two proportional arms.

“Yoohoo, Earth to Hunk, you good?” Pidge waved a hand in front of his face.

Hunk shook his head a bit, leaned back to avoid getting a finger in a place that would hurt, and looked around. Shiro wasn’t in the antechamber anymore, there was only him, Pidge, the case that was now closed, and his travel bag.

“Wow, you really got it bad,” she said, light glinting off her glass and her evil smile.

“Pidge,” Hunk warned.

“Don’t worry, I leave him and my beautiful brand new arm in your capable hands.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “Please, for both your sakes, do everything I wouldn’t do.”

“PIDGE!”

She left with a cackle. Hunk rubbed his face for a moment, hoping to make it feel less hot.

He did have a crush on Shiro. It even was more than a crush—he had crushes, nice, safe ones, even a couple that were reciprocated and tested and went nowhere save for good feelings and a few nice dates. Shiro was not “a couple nice dates and good feelings.” Shiro was—well, there was a different level of being with and relating to the other Paladins. They had shared something that was so much beyond the baseline of normal, had literally been linked mind to mind, had suffered losses and celebrated victories that belonged only to them. Even with that, Shiro was an incredibly private person, and Hunk wanted to be allowed in. He wanted to be able to touch and hug Shiro until Shiro stopped stiffening at every touch and allowed himself to lean in, to touch first.

Hunk wanted to see Shiro, free, and smiling, and in the sun.

It was so far beyond a crush.

Shiro came out of his rooms with a bag even smaller than Hunk’s, wearing his fatigue pants, beat-up boots, and a plain white tee shirt.

“Hmm,” Hunk said. “Is that it?”

Shiro smiled a bit, shrugged, the movement already looking perfectly natural with both arms. “I don’t keep much, and I travel light.”

“You sure? Sorry, I’m not trying to nag, it’s just that airports and shuttles are always kept way too cold,” Hunk said, rubbing at the sleeve of his jacket—green and yellow, like the only clothes he had brought to space and had worn for way too long. Thanks everything for the sonic cleaners of the Castle of Lions.

“Oh,” Shiro said, looking a bit to the side. “I might have something.” He dropped his bag by the door, waited an instant, turned to Hunk. “Do you mind coming in?”

Hunk blinked a bit at the rare, and unexpected, invitation. “Yeah, sure.”

Shiro smiled at him, opened the door that lead to his actual room. Hunk looked around, curious. There was the picture of the paladins and Coran they had taken the first year after… after. There was a picture face down on the shelf next to it, then a couple tablets, one much older than the other. Neatly-made bed, service weapon in arm’s reach of both bed and desk, desk with monitor switched off, desk chair, larger and comfier-looking chair in a corner, other arm and shoulder attachment on its own shelf—all in all, very empty. Shiro opened one of the closets integrated to the walls, and took a box from the very top shelf, above neatly hanging uniforms.

Hunk got the impression that was not a place Shiro looked at all that often.

Shiro put the box on the bed, took a breath.

“Hey man, you ok?”

Shiro turned his head to look at Hunk. “I— yeah. It’s just. That’s all I have left of before. Before Kerberos, before Voltron, before leaving.”

What was one supposed to say to something like that? Shiro was just far enough to be out of Hunk’s immediate reach—he didn’t immediately move to put a hand on his shoulder, and then Shiro moved to open the box.

There were a couple of off-school paper folders, squares that looked like pictures, a couple of speeders’ keys, a squished Garrison hat, something that looked like a wrist cuff, and in the middle, a brown leather jacket. Shiro took it out, shook it. No dust fell. He put it on.

“So,” he asked Hunk after an instant of silence, “What do you think?”

“Looks good,” Hunk answered, after he found his voice. “Looks very good.”

+

“Oh boy,” Hunk said three hours later, after the trip from the Garrison to the nearest airport, then the VIP security screenings where they just needed to show their IDs—being Coalition staff was as high as diplomatic immunity could go in this galaxy, apparently—then their takeoff from Los Angeles to fly to Tokyo, a four hours trip. He had spent so much time in space, in ships he piloted himself—or, really, was half-fused with so that intentions became movements—or in ships too big to feel the movements of, that he had forgotten how nauseous conventional flying made him.

Shiro, next to him, unfairly handsome and unruffled in his leather jacket, looked at him with concern. “Are you ok?”

“Just… don’t let me throw up on you, or on me, and we’ll be fine. It’s just,” Hunk made a wavy motion with his hand, “the whole… flying.”

Shiro caught the wandering hand in his flesh one, and squeezed, looking even more concerned. “You’ve been flying for years, is it still a problem?”

Hunk squeezed back. “I hope you are not attached to that hand, because you are not getting it back until we’re in Japan unless you need it urgently.” He took a breath, very much ignored the humming of the engines and how small the cabin was compared to, say, his kitchen onboard the Atlas. “And yes. Still. Sitting in the pilot’s seat in Yellow is very much not the same as flying on regular planetary lines.” Another breath. “At least it’s not Lance flying.” Small mercies. Lance still handled every ship that was not his Lion like it was a cargo ship and the people inside were an afterthought. Or his best friend just wanted to torture Hunk, always a possibility.

“It’s all right. Do you need a distraction?” Shiro weaved his fingers with Hunk’s.

“I…” Thank everything flying did not involve turbulence anymore—reading about it for his flight class had been enough to make Hunk sick. “I probably could watch a movie. Feel free to narrate and comment as much as you want.”

Shiro squeezed his—their hands, once more. “I’ll pick, then.”

Bless him, he picked something that pretended to be a romantic comedy with terrible acting. There was much to comment on. It didn’t distract Hunk from the nausea, but it helped with the anxiety, even if Shiro was wrong, wrong, wrong, Éloise was innocent and clearly it was all a plot by her neighbor Joséphine.

(There were both wrong. It was a wicked step-mother, because of course there was a wicked step-mother. At least it wasn’t an evil twin, and Hunk squeezed Shiro’s hand harder at that thought.)

+

And then Tokyo, and from Tokyo a shorter trip with a puddle-jumper—and then they were in Minami, half a day later and half a planet away. Hunk had never been to Japan before. He had never been to many places on Earth, he realized.

It was warm once out of the jumper terminal, with wind coming from the sea he could see beyond the town. At a glance, this place was about twice the size of the Garrison, nestled between sea and steep hills. Hunk could see mostly roofs and the contrast of centuries of different architectures, and not much more.

“Come on,” Shiro said, steering them toward an automated taxi. “Let’s go to the inn and drop off our things.”

“Inn?”

The taxi started once they sat down—its system spoke in Japanese, and Shiro replied in kind. For a second, Hunk wondered why the translators were not working. The minute after, he had to remind himself that he wasn’t on the Atlas, or on another planet: he was on Earth.

From Shiro’s amused glance, his thought process was obvious.

“We really spend too much time in space,” Hunk said.

“There’s no such thing. And yes, inn. I figured you’d never been to Japan, and the inns—at least, this inn, that’s the one I remember—are really nice.” The town itself passed them by on the way, the taxi’s automated system adding pictograms for restaurants, hotels and shops on the windows on the way. Hunk saw a lot of wooden facades, and too brief mentions that looked like historical plaques.

“Most of the city was rebuilt after WWIII and the Great Tokyo Earthquake,” Shiro said. “I don’t know how much the Galra invasion destroyed, here. It doesn’t look different from when I was a kid.”

“You grew up here?”

“Until I was seven, yeah.” Shiro watched the scenery pass with his chin in the palm of his hand, as the taxi took a road that went further into the hills, but still into the town. He didn’t add anything else. Hunk looked at him, at him looking outside.

After a couple more minutes, the taxi stopped in front of the gates leading to a large wooden building, several stories tall.

Hunk followed Shiro’s lead—followed him out of the taxi, followed the way he removed his shoes, did not even try to follow the conversation between him and the woman who greeted them in and took them to the second story and their room. The room itself was more than large, with a small table in the middle, sliding panels that were open on a second room on one side and on a sort of indoor balcony with more seating and then a gorgeous view of the gorge the inn was sitting on on the other.

When Hunk turned around to look for Shiro, after he had looked and aww-ed and hmm-ed for a while—but really, that balcony thing and the view were amazing, and the pieces of artworks scattered around were too pretty not to look at them—the woman had left and Shiro was looking at Hunk with an expression he did not know how to put a name to. It was a fond expression, and it was releasing the extra lines of tension Hunk hadn’t even noticed Shiro was carrying on his face.

“Dinner will be served in the room whenever we want after 5pm, and she will come back in to make the beds—futons, did you ever see one of those?—after. There is a bathroom attached to the room,” Shiro pointed to a panel Hunk would have never believed to be a door, “here, but they also have communal hot spring baths.” 

Hunk perked up. “Hot spring baths? That sounds great.” He stopped, thought for a moment. It wasn’t often they had to deal with jet lag—planetary visits rarely lasted more than a standard day, and Atlas kept its own schedule. The light coming from the windows was fairly bright, and not really looking like the late afternoon his brain believed to be in, accounting for travel time. “Wait, what time is it? Time zones are confusing.”

“It’s about… 1100, of what we’d call the next day.” They shared a quick moment of silence over how weird planetary time was.

“What’s your plan? Do you want to go to the grave right now or should we find a café or something?”

“I’m not hungry,” Shiro said. “Really Hunk, I’m fine, I don’t—“

“The last thing we ate and drank was airline food. Even if you’re not hungry, you at least need to drink something.” Shiro didn’t say anything, did not move. “Please, Shiro? For me?”

Shiro looked away. “I don’t— ok, fine, please put the eyes away.”

“I’ll have you know those are prize winning puppy eyes,” Hunk said. He was a bit worried he had pushed too far, but there was a smile dancing at the corner of Shiro’s lips.

“I’m aware. Lance was vocal about it.”

Hunk chuckled, went to grab his jacket and wallet from his bag. Shiro was doing the same on his side. They left the room and went down side by side.

“So,” Hunk said on the way, “Anything else I should know about what to do or not do in the inn, or pretty much anywhere else?”

Shiro was silent for a moment. One more silence, part of the same pattern of Shiro being quiet that he had noticed months ago now.

“I can’t think of anything,” he said as they waited for another automated taxi. “But I—“ he trailed off, and did not pick that thought back up again once they were in the taxi.

Hunk picked something of a one-sided conversation about cooking traditions and meals specific to the city after a bit. That taxi had to have some english functionality, as the windows displayed advertisements and pictures of the local restaurants and cafés as Hunk continued to speak, and Shiro only sometimes added information. Hunk ended up picking a place based on the pictures of their glasses of smoothies.

It was a little café, nestled among other wooden buildings, in a street that opened up to the harbor and the sea. Hunk let Shiro do the ordering, even if the items available were clear enough. There were just a couple people in, leaving Shiro and Hunk to their pick of seats. Hunk steered them toward a couch, barely big enough for the both of them.

The drinks indeed were as pretty as the pictures, and tasted great. After the first few sips, Hunk felt Shiro relax next to him.

“These are great. You were right.” Shiro took a deep breath. “Thanks.”

Hunk nudged him with his elbow. “No problem. And seriously, and correct me if I’m wrong, but you’ve gotten a little too used to just… ignoring when your body needs food and water, and then just shoving protein shakes down your throat to fix it.”

Shiro pointedly slurped his smoothie.

Hunk looked at him flatly. “Not exactly a brilliant retort, here.”

“I’m fine—no, let me finish,” Shiro said as Hunk was opening his mouth to strongly protest that assessment. “I’m fine, or I will be. Being the face of the Coalition, it’s more work than I ever thought possible, good work, important work. Getting the whole song and dance of galas and tours, it’s just… more to juggle, to plan. It doesn’t leave much time to breathe, let alone eat and drink.”

“You’re not exactly reassuring me, you know.”

And there, then, Shiro made the face— _ the _ face, the one the Paladins and Coran and Romelle and the bridge crew had noticed and named, the one that Shiro always made when someone was genuinely worried about him and he did not know how to react or respond. 

Hunk sighed as discreetly as he could. “I don’t need an answer, and I can’t exactly stop worrying, either.” The semi-sleepless nights they had shared on the Castle of Lion due to anxiety and PTSD seemed a lifetime away. “And I know you don’t like for us to fuss—but you’re worth fussing over.” He finished telling that to his almost empty glass, leaving time and space for Shiro to compose himself.

“Thanks,” Hunk heard once his glass was empty. Shiro’s glass was empty too, next to his.

They left the café shortly after that.

“You want to see a bit more of the town?” Shiro offered. “I need to look up a few things before going to the graveyard, probably not before tomorrow.” 

“No problem and yes please! Show me all the things. Also the sea. Is there a good beach around?”

Shiro smiled, almost laughed. “I don’t know about beaches, but there are nice spots in the rocks beyond the lighthouse.”

They spent the rest of the day exploring, Shiro occasionally pointing at something he remembered—the school he went to, a good restaurant, buildings he did not remember and looked new enough to have been built or rebuilt after Sendak’s invasion.

By the time they were tired, they had taken many pictures to send to their friends, they hadn’t gone to the spots in the rocks Shiro remembered, and it was getting dark enough that it did not seem a good idea to try to get there. They walked back to the inn in companionable silence. There was something incredibly peaceful about this place. Hunk breathed in, reveling in the clean, non-recycled and filtered air. Walking past some of the houses, he could smell delicious smells of cooking food.

He clamped both hands on his stomach at the loud rumble that came out. “Woops.”

Shiro smiled at him. “I’m guessing dinner first.”

“Yeah. New foods, new cooking! That’s exciting.” Hunk took one more breath of the nice smelling air. There was a breeze coming from the hills, making the trees rustle. This really was nothing like the desert, nothing like the Atlas. “This place is really nice.” He glanced at Shiro. “Thanks, for letting me tag along.”

Shiro looked at him again, with the same expression he had worn in the room earlier in the day. It was very soft, in the twilight. “I wouldn’t be here without you.”

+

That strange, soft mood stayed with them through the few minutes of walk left, and through the meal—excellent, and through which Hunk made Shiro tell him what everything was, at least what he could identify, with a couple mistakes and surprises. Afterward Hunk elected to check out the hot baths, putting on the thin and rather practical garment that came with the room that Shiro called a yukata, while Shiro stayed in their room, saying he’d catch up later.

Hunk was the only one in the baths. The water smelled a bit strange, but sitting in the hot water, hearing nothing but the river that had carved that gorge and the rustling of the night wind in the trees covering the hills was more than making up for it.

There wasn’t much to do in the water but sit and let the warmth go to his bones, so Hunk did exactly that—that and recast his mind to the day, and just how much Shiro had shared with him. It felt… special. Inside his chest, there was a warmth that had nothing to do with the water.

Shiro showed up to the baths maybe an hour after Hunk. The towel he was carrying in front of him, once the yukata was off, left very little to the imagination, not that Hunk needed imagination; they had spent a long time in very close proximity in the Lions on the way back to Earth, on top of the Garrison killing body shyness pretty thoroughly once one moved up to the space exploration track. But Shiro’s body wasn’t what Hunk saw first—rather, it was the lack of a body element. Shiro folded the towel somehow, left it a couple steps behind the edge of the bath, and slid into the water to sit on the same ledge Hunk was sitting on. Hunk was still staring-not-staring at the empty space where Shiro’s right arm should have been.

“Hunk?”

Hunk shook his head a bit. “Sorry, I somehow… keep forgetting.”

“Forgetting— Oh.” Shiro looked at his right shoulder. “I didn’t want to test it with the mineral water.”

“No sudden urge to face Pidge’s wrath?” Hunk tried to lighten up the atmosphere.

Shiro leaned more against the rocky wall of the baths, rolled his head. “No thank you, she’d find a way to make me test the arm in other adverse circumstances if I brought it back in a condition she didn’t plan for.”

Hunk immersed himself to his shoulders. “Is there really a situation Pidge does not plan for?”

They shared a quiet moment pondering that, and came to a mutual agreement to never think about it again. They continued to chit chat for a bit, until Hunk felt like his whole body was warm and pruney down to the muscle.

When they came back to the room, the beds were made and taking the whole of the second room, within arm’s reach of each other. By this point, they had both been awake for more than 24 hours. Not the longest either of them had been awake, but the day was definitively making itself felt. Hunk flopped on the closest bed, and groaned in appreciation. It felt wonderfully firm, with just enough give to not feel like he was sleeping on a stone.

Shiro turned the other bed open, stopped. “I can… move my bed, if you want.”

“What?” Hunk turned his head. “If you’re saying that because nightmares, don’t even think about it. I’ll throw the pillow at you if need be. Just get in there, man.” He blinked, then realized he had been half dozing, and that Shiro was still kneeling next to his bed in his boxers and sleeping shirt, the one Lance had brought back from a space mall that had the best approximation of a lion’s head and English an alien who had never seen Earth could come up with. Only then did Hunk realize he was on top of the covers, still in the yukata. His brief but valiant fight with taking it off, putting a shirt on and opening the covers made Shiro laugh, at least. One sidelamp was kept on, on the other side of the room. Hunk heard more than saw Shiro move around, checking the door and windows, before he returned to his bed and finally laid down.

“ ‘Night, Shiro.”

“Goodnight, Hunk.”

+

If Shiro had nightmares during the night, Hunk heard none of it. He vaguely remembered half waking in confusion at the loud trill of a bird—or what sounded like a bird, he had seen too many things not to wonder even on Earth—and going back to sleep as soon as he assessed his surroundings and he remembered that he was on Earth, and that the noise was not an alarm.

The next time he woke up, Shiro was already up, dressed, and seated at the table in the other room.

“Good morning, Hunk,” Shiro said like the horrible morning person he was. Hunk was reasonably sure Shiro had already gone for a run and a shower.

Hunk took his time to stretch and yawn. “What time is it?”

“A little after 9.” The run and shower was a certainty. Shiro letting him sleep off the jet lag made him feel warm inside.

On the table was what Hunk assumed was breakfast: tea, bowls of rice and brothy soup, a piece of fish for each of them. Hunk tried a little of everything, side-eyed Shiro when he gave him some of the dishes from his side of the table.

Shiro only shook his head. “I’m not a fan of those.” He continued sipping tea while Hunk finished eating. By all appearances, he was calm, but there was something in his stance that was almost fidgety.

“You ok?” Hunk asked.

Shiro made a noncommittal noise. “A bit nervous.” He quickly tried to wave Hunk’s unvoiced concern away. “I’m fine, just, not sure of what I’m expecting, or not expecting.”

They finished preparing for the day in relative silence. For all of Hunk’s half-frantic searching of Japanese funeral customs, he hadn’t gotten a clear picture of what was expected, and everything seemed to depend on personal faith, local traditions, how long since the funeral and other criteria he hadn’t dared ask Shiro about. Most information at least seemed to agree that offerings of food and incense were a norm. Hunk made sure the two small round cakes he had made the last day on the Atlas from ingredients coming from all over the universe were intact in their wrappers, and placed the box in his messenger bag.

“Do you mind if we walk?” Shiro asked him when they left the room. Hunk had half expected for him to wear his dress uniform, but he was wearing the same jacket as the day before, with another white tee shirt and dark pants.

“Of course not.” It was a beautiful day, with the breeze coming from the sea now that it was full daylight, bringing in the cries of seagulls and the smell of salt. They made the walk in silence, Hunk following Shiro’s unvoiced directions.

The graveyard was on the side of a small, steep hill, facing the sea. The graves were arranged on steps carved off the hill, with trees providing a bit of shadows and multiple flights of stairs made of stone. Hunk expected to have to climb up right away, but instead Shiro kept walking on the lowest level, where the street was, passing most of the graveyard. He stopped seemingly at random to cross the street and enter one of the few shops that lined that side.

Hunk couldn’t read the sign above the door, but the arrangement in the window was pretty clear: this was a flower and funeral shop. Shiro had gone straight to the clerk, or shop owner, a woman in a dark kimono and hair as white as Shiro’s. After a bit of conversation Hunk didn’t understand, she left for the back of the shop.

Shiro let out a breath. Then he glanced at Hunk. “I called yesterday. I wasn’t sure it could be done in a rush,” he said.

“‘It’ what?” Hunk asked. The woman came back with a box that wasn’t much bigger than both of Hunk’s hands open. She opened it to reveal a simple rectangle of grey stone, on which were engraved the only kanji Hunk knew to recognize: Shirogane Takashi, Shiro’s full name.

Hunk had questions, but didn’t know how to put them together.

Shiro paid, and they left the shop, Shiro holding the box in his right hand. It seemed significant, somehow.

They crossed the street again. They started climbing the nearest set of stairs.

“Shiro,” Hunk said. “That stone…” He trailed off, kept climbing—they were on the fourth level of graves now.

“It’s not for me— or in a sense, it is.” Shiro made a gesture. “Left now.” He paused, then continued as they kept walking. “My original body died, but I didn’t. The one who was in this body was killed, but I wasn’t. In a sense, another me passed away and unlike the people on the Memorial Wall, or cemeteries, there was nothing left to mark that he existed and that he passed away.”

Hunk reached out and took Shiro’s hand, squeezed. “I’m sorry we didn’t get to know him better. That until the end we thought he was you.” The other Shiro who had wanted nothing else but to be a Paladin, who had suffered through the Voltron shows along with them, who Haggar had created and had killed. “I’m sorry he never got his own name.”

Shiro stopped, squeezed back. He opened his mouth, closed it, swallowed, opened it again. “Thank you.”

The grave Shiro was here for wasn’t that far, after that. They didn’t stop holding hands.

The grave was taller than Hunk had been expecting, seeing the rest of the cemetery, although most graves after that one seemed just as big and old-looking, like they had weathered the elements for much longer. Even without being able to read the names, Hunk could see the stone held far more than three names, and there were multiple stones the size of the one Shiro still held fixed in front and around it.

“It’s…” Shiro started, and then stopped, his hand squeezing Hunk’s reflexedly before he let go and took the couple of steps necessary to be face to face with it. The stone was as tall as him. Shiro crouched, and touched the stone below characters Hunk knew. The only ones he knew. Shiro’s name.

“How—oh.” Hunk let out a breath. “Oh. That must have been—“

“—After Kerberos,” Shiro agreed. He chuckled, a small sound that didn’t seem that happy. “Would you believe that I forgot about it?”

Hunk shrugged. “You weren’t there.” They let the silence fall. The wind rustled up in the trees around them. They could hear the city, automated cars passing, the odd seagull cry.

Shiro took the stone out of the box, and placed it by his name on the main stone. He took a large breath, then stood up.

Hunk cleared his throat. “If that’s ok, I have something.” Shiro turned his head to look at him. Hunk held up the two small wrapped cakes. “I hadn’t planned for more than two, but I hope they won’t mind.”

“That— thank you,” Shiro whispered. He took a step back, and Hunk took a step forward, placing the cakes at the foot of the main stone. From up close, the sheer quantity of names was awe-inspiring, and he felt really small, even if he was as tall as the stone.

“Shiro, how many people’s name are marked here?”

“I never counted. I think there’s about ten generations? It was set a century and a half before WWIII, and some markers were lost in earthquakes through the years.”

So much history, so much time. It was funny, in a way. They had crossed the universe and grappled with aliens older than the human race, but this stone, here and now, was giving him a perspective on time he rarely had to face.

“Is there— I mean, should I say anything?”

Shiro crossed his arms. “I don’t know the details. Never knew the proper rituals.” He rubbed his face with his left hand. “I lived here until I was seven. I only came back once, for a funeral. I know the language but I don’t know the culture, or the food, or— or what you asked me yesterday, what to do or not do.” He let his arm drop, but the tension in his frame didn’t let up. “We thought we had more time. We always thought we had more time. Now I have time and I don’t know where to even start.”

This, this was probably some of what Shiro had been carrying and working through on his own, on top of everything else—Voltron, Allura’s death, the Coalition. Hunk stepped back, and telegraphed his move as he reached out and put his arm around Shiro’s shoulders. Shiro’s arm came up to rest on Hunk’s back right away, and Shiro was the one to press his head to Hunk’s.

“That’s been brewing for a while, hasn’t it?”

Hunk felt Shiro nod. “Hadn’t realized how much.” They both breathed deep, syncing up after a minute.

After a moment, Hunk prodded Shiro again: “Do you want to stay any longer?”

Shiro shook his head. “No. I can come back. How about we find the spots behind the lighthouse?”

So that was what they did.

+

They should have expected the nightmares, at this point.

They had spent the day outside, finding the spots to get down to the sea in rocky coves, putting their feet in only briefly before retreating back to the town. Neither had packed swim trunks or towels, and the water was far colder than Hunk preferred swimming in. 

Shiro had humored Hunk for lunch, letting himself be dragged into a hole-in-the-wall place that mostly made food on sticks and translating everything for Hunk, including the conversation with the chef that devolved into broken bits of languages and gestures. Hunk suspected Shiro had used that as a way to distract himself from, well, everything. He had been quiet, again, the tension in his shoulders visible but like it was a habitual tension, there for so long Shiro’s body didn’t know how to be without it.

When they went back to the inn, late in the afternoon, Hunk had made a beeline for the hot baths after asking Shiro point blank if he was ok and needed space. The naked gratitude on Shiro’s face at the question and having only to give a simple answer had twisted at Hunk’s heart.

Shiro didn’t join him in the baths. Hunk stayed in until he felt like even his bones were turning pruny, turning the visit to the grave in his mind. He hadn’t realized how… isolated, in a sense, Shiro was. There had been a hint, with the other Shiro, and how he hadn’t sent any messages back to Earth with Sam Holt, but how much had that been Shiro and how much had it been the other Shiro missing even more things from his thoughts and memories? And with what he had revealed, how little he knew of his childhood’s culture, it looked like Shiro didn’t have living family members with that knowledge and that culture, and possibly no remaining family members at all.

In some small, terrible way, it explained why Shiro and Keith were so devoted to each other: they had chosen each other, and at some point they were all each other had.

Hunk groaned and immersed himself in the water until it lapped at his chin. And now Keith was on the other side of the universe with the Blades of Marmora while Shiro headed the Coalition and was, all too often, on his own, with barely the tether of their collective video chat. Shiro had friends on the Atlas, but not… not them, the small exclusive club of Voltron Paladins and close associates, not like Hunk had his kitchen crew and his family, not like Pidge had her staff and her family, not like Coran and Romelle and the Alteans, Lance and his family and his attachment to Cuba, Keith and his mother and the Blades.

Hunk returned to their room as the night fell. Dinner had been served, kept warm by lids on top of the bowls and small heaters. Shiro was seated in the indoor balcony and looking outside, head resting on his palm, elbow on the sill of the open window, tablet resting on one thigh.

Hunk wanted very much to sear this image in the back of his eyes.

They shared the meal like they had shared the one from the day before, with Shiro naming the dishes and food he recognized. There was a lot more of food labeled “I don’t know” this time around, which Hunk took as an excuse to try them and try his best to figure out based on his very limited knowledge of Japanese food. It at least pulled a couple of smiles out of Shiro, and everything, once again, was delicious.

They each prepared for bed in their own way. Hunk was in bed, sending a couple of pictures of the sea and the lighthouse from his phone to Lance, when Shiro came back from the attached bathroom. He was quiet, again, as he made the rounds of the room, checking door and window.

“Shiro,” Hunk said to Shiro’s back. Shiro was just sitting on his bed, looking out into the other room without really seeing it. He turned his head slowly. With the sole lighted lamp that was kept in the other room casting very low warm light, he looked like a painting, something ancient, and appropriately dramatic and mysterious. “You know, if you need to talk, about anything, I’ll listen. And if you don’t wanna talk, that’s fine too. I’ll still be there.”

Shiro breathed out. “Thanks.” He opened his mouth like he was going to say more, but instead he moved to get in bed, and said “Good night, Hunk.”

“ ‘Night, Shiro.”

They should have expected the nightmares.

Hunk opened his eyes in the middle of the night, the only light the lamp in the other room, to the overwhelming feeling that something had changed, that something did not belong.

There it was again, a mutter in a language he knew but wasn’t from here, something he had associated both with danger and with a safety that came only in his kitchen and with his staff. There, again, a whisper, as if the throat it came from had gone raw from screaming too much. There was only one place, one person, this could be coming from. Hunk opened his eyes and looked across the divide that separated his bed from Shiro’s, just the space that one arm thrown in between would bridge, a universe away.

In the half light, Hunk could see Shiro’s silhouette but no details. He was curled on himself, protecting stomach and torso and face, right arm around his head, covers pushed to his feet. Another mutter, muffled.

“Shiro,” Hunk said. He stayed still, stayed quiet, too aware of what Shiro could do if startled when like this. There had been a couple of times, on their way back to Earth in the Lions, a couple of close calls. Shiro always stopped in time, always apologized, but the shadows never left his eyes. Hunk refused to let more shadows in here and now, during Shiro’s first leave, during Shiro’s reacquaintance with his roots or however he wanted to call or not call this. “Shiro,” he repeated, as the first word had not been enough to break through to him.

Another exhale, this one rough and shuddering. Shiro curled further on himself.

“Shiro,” Hunk said, once more. “Wherever you are, you’re not there, you’re here, with me, in the really cool inn you booked because you wanted to show me this place properly. And you did, because man, those hot baths are awesome.” He kept going in this manner, keeping a steady stream of words and reassurances, all in the same language, the English they both spoke, and tried his best to ignore the whimpers interspaced with broken Galra. Shiro spoke perfect Trade Galra, Krolia and Axca had made sure of it; and so did Hunk, because it was the most shared language in the kitchen and in the food markets of the known universe. But this, curled in the bed, it wasn’t Shiro from now. It was Shiro from then, from before Voltron, or maybe even during. There had been more than enough going on to get reoccurring nightmares that no amount of therapy could touch. Hunk knew that first hand.

Another shudder then Shiro seemed to even stop breathing. Hunk held his breath until Shiro rolled to his back, both hands going to his face. Even muffled, his breathing was rough—but rough for different reasons.

“You okay?”

“Sorry I woke you,” came the answer from behind Shiro’s hands.

Hunk frowned. “You know I don’t mind, not for this.”

Shiro let his hands drop. “I mind, I don’t want—“ He bit the rest of his words, face turned to the ceiling.

Hunk turned to his side a little more, scooting until he was right at the edge of his futon, and laid his hand in between their beds. “Hey,” he said.

Shiro sighed, like all the fight and tension were letting out, his shoulders relaxing in the bedding. He turned to face Hunk. There was something shockingly intimate and secretive about being awake in the middle of the night. Hunk’s eyes had gotten used to the half-light by now, and he could see more details now: Shiro’s throat moving as he swallowed, the glint of light reflecting in his eyes, the dull shine of his right arm.

Shiro reached out, and covered Hunk’s right hand with his left. It didn’t take long until his thumb moved, brushing Hunk’s fingers.

“You wanna talk about it?”

Shiro sighed. “I don’t want to put more on you.” His voice was low, as if they needed to keep quiet from other people. Hunk could imagine they were much younger, were having a sleepover, needed to not wake hypothetical parental figures. Shiro started again: “You’ve— When I said I wouldn’t be there without you, I meant it. Thank you.”

Hunk swallowed the first wave of emotion. “I’m glad. That I’m here with you, that you let me in, that I can help.” Shiro’s hand tightened on Hunk’s. The silence settled, broken only by the barely-there sound of their breath, the wind outside, the minute creaks of the wood of the inn.

“I forget I have a body sometimes.”

This seemed to come from nowhere, and it left Hunk breathless for a moment. Shiro, seemingly oblivious to the effect of his words were having, or pointedly not noticing, his eyes fixed on their joined hands, continued: “Sleeping, it’s too close to the astral plane sometimes. I keep dreaming of it, of waking up and feeling nothing and being— not here. Then I wake up and nothing hurts, and it doesn’t feel real.” He took a shuddering breath that Hunk felt through their hands. “Or I dream of the arena, and it’s nothing but hurt.”

Hunk had to swallow to make sure his words would be clear. “Shiro. I’m going to hug you now.” In the absence of protest, Hunk grabbed his blanket with one hand, and moved until he was on Shiro’s bed, slotting himself against Shiro from shoulder to hip, dragging both their blankets and bedding to cover them. Hunk moved until they were comfortable, Shiro resting his head on Hunk’s shoulder. If there was one good thing about Shiro’s prosthetic, it was that it couldn’t exactly fall asleep if either of them spent the rest of the night on top of it. Hunk’s left arm went around Shiro’s shoulders, his hand resting in Shiro’s hair. Shiro shuddered and went boneless at the first few passes of Hunk’s fingers through his hair. Hunk’s other hand went to rest on Shiro’s side, in the fabric of his shirt. Shiro’s left arm completed the hug, his hand warm on Hunk’s ribs.

They were perfectly placed for Hunk to be able to nuzzle Shiro’s head. So he did. Shiro stopped breathing for a few heartbeats when Hunk kissed his hair. Hunk stayed in place, waited.

“You deserve better,” Shiro finally said, his voice almost too low to be heard.

“Bullshit,” Hunk told him. “You deserve good things, and I’m exactly where I want to be.” He resumed the petting. “I love you, a lot. I am more than fine if my feelings are not returned, because you are my friend and having you in my life is enough. But this deserving better than you? Bullshit. You are the best person I know.” Hunk’s shoulder felt a bit damp. He kissed Shiro’s head again. “And in case it feels like I’m expecting an answer from you: I’m not, not right this moment—take all the time you need, and also I want to ask you out properly. But right here, right now? It’s for you, just for you.” He tightened the hug for a moment. “Do you want to try to go back to sleep?”

He felt Shiro nod against his shoulder.

“Okay then. We can talk in the morning.”

Shiro squeezed him before relaxing. Hunk breathed in deep. They could do this.

They could. 

+

By the time Hunk woke up, he was very surprised, and pleasantly so, to see that Shiro was still asleep. They didn’t seem to have moved much through the rest of the night, Shiro was still half on him, but now their legs were tangled together. It was very, very nice.

Hunk breathed deep, and basked in the warmth of the moment.

Shiro made a noise, something like half a snore. He used to snore a lot more, in both bodies—Hunk had a thought for the clone and the horrors he had to have been put through to replicate Shiro’s injuries, including the one that had caused the snoring. After a couple years at the helm of the Atlas, Shiro had followed his physicians’ recommendations and fixed what was fixable. Thank everything for the medical tech they had now, and how fast it had made the recovery. Hunk unconsciously tightened the arm he had around Shiro’s shoulders. Seeing the low panic Shiro had done his utmost to hide from start to finish had not been fun.

It was a small miracle to be there, with Shiro in his arms.

Hunk very deliberately breathed in, breathed out, and let the all too vivid memory of Shiro’s limp body and blue lips after he had gone hand to hand with Sendak on the hull of a ship breaking atmosphere pass through his mind without fixating on it. The Shiro who was there in his arms was warm and had no problem breathing, his lips were the pinkish tan a few shades darker than his skin they always were. There was no desert here, just a gorgeously simple wood ceiling, hard but comfy bedding under him, and the window showed blue and green, sky and forest.

Shiro’s hand was right over Hunk’s heart now, and during a particularly deep inhalation, Hunk felt it tighten over the fabric of his sleep shirt. Shiro was awake then, between one blink and the next.

“Good morning,” Hunk said. He was determined to not have awkwardness happen—but part of that was on Shiro and what he decided to do.

Shiro breathed, his ribcage expanding against Hunk’s. Then he moved his head up, not raising it from Hunk’s shoulder, just enough for them to see each other face to face.

“ ‘Morning,” he answered.

When it was clear that Shiro would not expand on that, Hunk put his right hand on the hand Shiro still had resting above his heart. “How are you feeling?”

Hunk liked that Shiro did not immediately answer with “I’m fine,” that he took his time and was honest and trusted Hunk with a real answer. “I’m not sure.” Shiro moved a bit, body to body without it going further than contact, the reassurance of a breathing body against another. Hunk was put in mind of a big cat rubbing itself against a person. “I’m— better than during the night, for sure. Thank you,” and there was a wealth of meanings in that thank you.

Another deep breath from Shiro, and he moved to sit up, pushing the blanket to his waist. Hunk flinched at the sudden chill, dragging his own blanket back on him. Shiro turned back to look at him.

“Were you serious, last night?”

There was the temptation to ask what about, to give both of them an out. Hunk firmly pushed it aside. He had been serious about everything last night, confessions included.

“Yes.” Hunk moved up, so that he was sitting shoulder to shoulder with Shiro. “About everything.” He didn’t pause to wonder about his own actions, and took Shiro’s hand in his. It was the metal one—it felt warm, probably from having been slept on most of the night.

“I don’t know when I can give you an answer. I feel like I’m taking advantage of everything you’re doing for me, and my track record with relationships is… not the best.”

“Can’t take advantage of what’s freely given.” Hunk squeezed Shiro’s hand with both of his. “Also I want to call bullshit on the relationships, they just weren't the right relationships for you, and maybe if it comes to that, we'll find that this one isn't either, but that still won't be your fault. Unless you sabotage it. Or you cause me deliberate hurt and pain, which is really not you,” Shiro flinched and Hunk immediately cut in, “nope, whatever you just thought about, up to and including clone memories, is not part of this conversation— this is the preliminary conversation, where I’m telling you again I’m willing to wait as long as you need and I still haven’t asked you out properly anyway.” Hunk took a deep breath. “So. We should have breakfast. We should figure out our day while having said breakfast; mine is going to include more one-on-one time with the hot baths; I’m willing to pencil you in at some point.”

Shiro leaned into Hunk’s side. Hunk took it as a step in the right direction, one more, even if Shiro couldn’t express quite what he wanted, or how touch-starved he was. “Breakfast sounds good.” 

So they had breakfast, the tray brought by the same person who had brought it the previous day, though they stayed side by side in the bedding for another good ten minutes, just breathing.

“I think I’ll go back to the cemetery,” Shiro said over his bowl of rice, mid-way through the meal. He was looking at the piece of fish right in front of him, not at Hunk.

Hunk took a sip of tea. “Do you want company?”

Shiro shook his head. “No. I think I need to do this alone, today.”

Hunk nodded. “I’m going to go find postcards and souvenirs. Both Shay and Lance will want something shiny.” It made Shiro smile, a little smile that hid at the corner of his lips, but a smile all the same.

It did not take long for them to dress and get ready after that. Shiro declined Hunk’s offer to meet up for lunch, saying he wasn’t sure how long he’d be. They walked into town instead of taking an automated taxi, and went their separate ways at, according to Hunk’s phone map, the crossing that led to the cemetery on one side, and the town center on the other. There were a few people out, and more automated cars and delivery vans in the street itself. Hunk watched Shiro leave and he thought that Shiro didn’t quite fit— he was very tall, not that Hunk wasn’t, but it somehow seemed more obvious, with the hair, and the way he walked through the street, almost in the same way he strode through the Atlas but not quite. It was a very defensive walk, Hunk realized later, during his own walking around, taking space and claiming a place, in a crowd that had a pace he didn’t know yet.

Hunk clutched at the shiny hair pin with flowers made of wires and stones he had picked up for Shay, thinking about places and histories and claiming space, and wished he had a better idea how to help Shiro out than “be there and hope for the best.” 

He sent more pictures of the sea and nice buildings to Lance, who retaliated with the many selfies he had taken with apparently the entire class of reforestation and eco-conversation he had joined on Nabooine. Pidge, to the picture of the sea and the quite nice automated car parked by the harbor-looking area, replied only with an animated emoji that wiggled its pixelated eyebrows. Coran got the sea and the hills, and Hunk was asked about the chemical makeup of the sea in return, and if it was the same one as in Cuba. Keith did not reply to the picture of the lighthouse and ancient-looking rounded sculptures that seemed to have faces before Hunk took a lunch break from wandering around in a really nice noodle place tucked in a side street. But when Keith replied, his message was to the point:  _ r u both ok _ .

Hunk stared at the screen. In the current moment? He was good. Shiro? He had no idea about. But would Shiro talk to Keith more easily? Had Shiro talked to Keith recently, about everything?

_ I am. Not sure about Shiro. Did he ever talk about his family? _

The answer came fast:  _ yes was one of the ways he got to me first year _

Hunk sighed, thumbs hovering over the keyboard, then took a chance:  _ I don’t know how to help. Ideas? _

The answer came even faster this time:  _ u r there & he asked u to be there. he never ask for things for himself u r already helping _

That didn’t exactly answer his question, but Hunk felt a bit better…until the next text:  _ so u guys kissed already or what don’t make me lose bet _

Hunk put his phone face down, and very calmly returned to his bowl of noodles. His friends were, universally, assholes.

+

The hot baths, Hunk had decided, were the absolute best part of the inn. He happily slouched on the ledge he was sitting on until the water lapped at his chin. After walking around for most of the day, the heat of the pools felt amazing. The Atlas had a pool center, but no warm baths like this. Maybe he should talk Shiro and Sam Holt into making something similar; there were, after all, many species and people working on the Atlas who came from cultures that were more social, and communal bathing, or even just kinda marinating in hot water like he was doing now, was pretty widespread.

He still wasn’t any closer to having an idea how to help Shiro, or even if said help was needed at the moment. Shiro was a very private person, and him reconnecting to the place his family had come from was a very personal thing. Maybe Keith was right, and being there was enough.

He wasn’t any closer to figuring out the conversation he and Shiro still needed to have, and how to ask Shiro out for real, either. Should he wait for Shiro to breach the subject, or should he make the first move, beyond the preliminaries of the night and morning.

The sun was setting now, giving everything the light touched a golden glow. This place was like nothing Hunk had seen across the universe, it was almost hard to believe it existed on the same planet he had grown up on.

He was half lost in reflections on how much beauty there was to see in the universe and knowing full well he would never see even a tiny fraction of it in his life and the dual immensity and reassurance of that thought, when Shiro joined him. Like the time before, he came without his arm, and with only the smallest towel in front of him once he took the yukata off, not that it was really needed. But now, the towel felt a bit like a tease—and seeing Shiro’s side-smile, it totally was one.

Hunk narrowed his eyes. “I believe that’s not playing fair.”

Shiro smiled a bit more, walked in the hot bath. “Can’t blame a guy for trying, now can you?”

“I can swoon a bit if that helps, at the sight of your handsome handsomeness and general,” Hunk moved his hands, gesturing broadly at Shiro, “everything.”

Shiro ducked his head, his smile bashful, and Hunk decided to take the pink tint spreading across his cheekbones as a result of the heat, at least until he had verbal confirmation that yes, Shiro was flirting back and interested.

The noise Shiro made when he immersed himself up to his chin in the warm water was one Hunk could echo wholeheartedly. Plus there was the thing where Shiro’s back and shoulder knots probably had knots themselves—now there was a thought. “Hey Shiro, how do you feel about massages?”

Shiro frowned, turning his head just enough to watch Hunk and not get a centimeter of skin out of the water. “That… depends. I like to see who’s coming behind me. It puts a limit on who I let get my back.”

Hunk nodded. “Makes sense, that’s why I prefer not to go to the massage therapists in the gym.” There were three, and Lance had made fast friends with them, getting tips and tricks when he was on the Atlas. “Lance and Shay taught me some,” he offered.

“Shay?”

“Yeah, they have a traditional form—it’s not completely adaptable to humans, but it feels great after a long rush.”

Shiro’s eyebrows danced in amusement and confusion. “I feel like I know very little of what actually goes on in the kitchen.”

Hunk pulled his tongue at him. “You try cooking for six hours straight or more, it feels like your arms are ready to fall off by the end of it. Everyone who wants one getting a quick or not so quick massage at the end, when everything is clean? Feels like heaven. It probably helps with reconnecting to your team, too. I bet you have no idea how much yelling, swearing, and rising emotions there is during a rush.”

Shiro moved, straightening up from the slouch he had taken to be fully immersed. “I probably really don’t.”

“So, I’m just saying,” Hunk took the tip of his fingers out and wiggled them, “I can offer massages—limited in scope, but massage.”

“And you get your hands on me.” Shiro winked.

Hunk blushed, groaned, and threw a hand over his face. He’d have sent water on Shiro as well if doing so in there didn’t feel some kind of sacrilegious act. “Oh my god, dude, you have to throw me a bone there, are you flirting back for real, because—“ Hunk took a breath, took his hand off his face “—I need this to be 100% on the level. And yes, getting my hands on you, but also I’m half crying in sympathy at the tension in your shoulders.”

Shiro was looking back at him. The playfulness he had came in with was absent, and Hunk wasn’t sure how to name his expression. There was seriousness, and solemness, and shyness, too.

“I’d say yes,” he said. “If you asked me out,” he clarified after a second.

Hunk had pretty much no idea how to react to that, now. Being suave wasn’t his forte— and then Shiro struck the coup de grâce: “I trust you.”

It was one thing to know it because of the Lions and the bond they had shared. It was another for Shiro to say it, and it still be true even years after the Lions had left.

“Hey, Shiro,” Hunk said, “I’d really like to kiss you, now.”

So they did. Not long, not a film production of a kiss, more of an introduction, a “we have known each other for a long while and trust each other and all that and there’s more” kind of introduction.

“That’s a yes on the massage, by the way,” Shiro said after they broke apart and sat side by side for a while, just being there.

Hunk hummed. “Good. That can be the next item on the agenda.” Then he frowned. “Did you know our friends bet on when or if we’d kiss?”

Shiro snorted. “Them and all the bridge crew, off-shift included. Probably most of engineering. The pilots for sure.”

Hunk frowned. He barely interacted with the bridge crew, save for Veronica, and same for engineering and the various pilots stationed on the Atlas. Then it dawned on him: the common denominator there wasn’t Hunk, it was Shiro, Shiro, who had apparently had a crush as obvious to his friends and co-workers as Hunk had.

Shiro clearly saw the dawning realization on Hunk’s face. He ducked his head, and the redness spreading across his face was definitively not the result of the temperature of the water.

Hunk stared in wonder, and the warmth he felt had very little to do with the hot spring.

“So much for being suave and all,” Shiro said, passing his hand over his face and keeping it over his eyes.

Hunk chuckled, and went to take Shiro’s hand, to stop Shiro from hiding behind it. He didn’t let go of it after, lacing his fingers with Shiro’s. “Let’s leave the suave and all to Lance, it’s more his style.”

And then they kissed again.

+

There was something intimidating about having all of Shiro spread before Hunk.

They had left the baths when a couple more people had come in, had a, once again, excellent dinner, and then retreated to the bed area, where Shiro had taken all his clothes off for the previously promised massage. He had been very efficient about it, not trying to be a tease.

Shiro then had sprawled out on his stomach, showing his back to Hunk, and there was so much trust in that gesture Hunk felt his throat tighten with emotions. Hunk was no stranger to what Shiro looked like. Just a couple hours ago or so, they had been naked in the hot baths side by side. But it was the gesture, the apparent unselfconsciousness that went with it when just a few hours ago Shiro had shared that he didn’t trust people at his back.

Shiro turned his head from where it was resting on his crossed arms. “Liking what you see?”

Hunk shook himself a bit before getting closer with towels from the bathroom and a small bottle of lotion.

“That fall under the banner of ‘trick questions,” he answered. “Plus, yeah, you’re hot, but I like all of you, man, not just the package.” He wrinkled his nose at the unintentional double entendre. “Maybe not the best choice of words, there.” 

Shiro laughed, muffled by his arms. He had put the prosthesis back on as soon as he had gone back to the room. Hunk sat down cross-legged by his side, held the towels.

“Put that under you, mister. Let’s not drip oil all over the nice bedding.”

Hunk used the few minutes it took for Shiro to do this to look at him once more, trying to see the tension. Aside from, well, everywhere, and wasn’t that depressing, the worst seemed to be his upper back. But first:

“Hey, would you be comfortable taking your arm off?”

The question hung between them for a moment. When Shiro’s left hand moved to the release points however, there was no hesitation. Trust, again.

“Okay,” Hunk said. Shiro put his arm to the side, within reach. “Okay.” Hunk breathed. “Let me know if anything hurts or is uncomfortable.”

Shiro hummed in response.

It wasn’t long before Hunk realized he was in over his head. “Holy shit dude, how are you moving? Your knots have knots!”

Shiro grunted. “Stubbornness.”

“If it’s Keith who told you that, pot, kettle, black, all that.” Hunk tried to press or reach or do anything more than reach across Shiro’s back and weep at the stones masquerading as muscles there.

“It was Curtis, but Keith might have gotten a few words in about that.”

Hunk wondered for a minute what the done thing was, there. His, what, almost-boyfriend? (just thinking the word made his brain short-circuit for an instant) was bringing up his ex casually in the conversation, was he allowed to ask? But Shiro had been his friend, was his friend, and one of the people he had brain melded with to pilot a giant space robot, screw wondering about the done thing. He was going to ask, because Shiro never volunteered information.

“You and Curtis—and tell me to back off anytime—what happened? You seemed to go along.”

Shiro sighed under Hunk’s hand. The momentary release allowed Hunk’s fingers to find a couple more sore points, and Shiro grunted at the knots being poked and twisted, with the good kind of grunt.

“He wanted things I couldn’t give.” Another grunt, under Hunk’s hand, another knot. “After a while, it was either making it official and having one of us have to leave the bridge due to conflicts of interests, or breaking it off. There was no space for compromise.”

He had tensed up again, talking. Hunk moved, but he was limited here on the side.

“Hey, I can’t reach well. Is it okay with you if I kind of straddle you? Not like, sexually— ah, er, maybe later—“ Hunk felt himself go red. Shiro had turned his head to him, smile wide.

“For the record,” he said, still smiling wide, “I like that.” And then he winked.

“How did I ever think you were awesome, you are the worst.”

Shiro chuckled.

Somehow, Shiro’s shoulders felt even more knotted up when Hunk was sitting on top of Shiro’s ass, a towel and his own boxers separating them. 

“You can keep going,” Shiro said in the pillow. Hunk felt like he was already going as hard as he could, every ounce of strength in his arms, shoulders and upper body from fighting with food and his kitchen all day going to trying to release the tension in Shiro’s back.

Shiro’s back was not yielding.

Hunk slumped over, hooking his chin to Shiro’s left shoulder. “Sorry. I thought I could help, but what I know is not enough.”

He sighed. Under him, Shiro sighed, too, and then relaxed further.

“Oh. Wait, you like me sprawling all over you?” Hunk made to move, but Shiro’s hand went up to pat his head to stop him.

“Yeah,” Shiro said. With his head turned, they were literally nose to nose. “Don’t move.” He took a deep breath, followed by an even deeper exhale.

“Wait, lemme take off my shirt.” It’d help with the touch starvation, and well, it’d just be nicer and would avoid getting more stains from the massage oil.

Shiro’s hand went back to Hunk’s head when he sprawled back in place. The petting was nice. Hunk didn’t quite know what to do with his hands, so his left went to the side over the bedding and the floor near Shiro’s arm, and his right one went to Shiro’s side, thumb rubbing back and forth over the ribs.

“Cuddles time. Awesome. You need me to move, tell me anytime.”

Shiro hummed in response. “S’good like that.”

Between the hot springs, the food, and now the prolonged skin contact, Hunk started to feel himself drift off. At least until Shiro started talking:

“That’s also why it didn’t work out with Curtis. I had to be the big one, the strong one, the larger than life one, Captain Shirogane. No much of a place for Shiro-just-Shiro.”

“You like that I’m as big as you.” Hunk very much picked the one element that was possibly the least heavy out of the whole sentence, but he still found himself smiling. In a world full of aliens, most of them bigger than humans, it had been less of an issue than when growing up on Earth and always being the biggest and largest kid around. It felt good, somehow, that that one thing that had singled him out and that he had had—and still had—a complicated relationship with was one thing Shiro found attractive.

Shiro opened his eyes. This close, it was easy to see the nuances of grey in his irises, the flecks of darker colors, the ring of almost black blue around his pupils.

“You’re as big as me,” he said, a confirmation and an agreement all in one. “I got your back, and you got mine.”

“Every step of the way. And that was probably a leg pun. I assume and am proud of it.”

Shiro chuckled, and Hunk could feel it move through him. Body to body like this, it almost, but not quite, felt like being linked again. Maybe that would be what sex together would feel like, a feedback loop of me-them-us, closed circuit of sensations and feelings.

Shiro tugged his hair a little, adding to the sensation. “You thought of something.”

“Being like this,” and Hunk wiggled a bit, just to feel it, skin to skin, “it’s a bit like being in the Lions, mind to mind again, except just with our bodies. I was wondering if sex was going to feel even more like it.”

A pause. “Want to find out?” But Shiro’s words weren’t quite as assured as everything else he had said until now, his tone not quite there, not quite the tone of a guy saying “hey, wanna have sex” with enthusiastic consent waving pom-poms in the back. It sounded more like he was asking because he was supposed to.

Hunk frowned a bit before he could catch the expression off his face, then he hummed. “Nah. This is good. We got plenty of time for sex later—or even never.”

The expression on Shiro’s face was that one again, the one that said he didn’t understand the care people were taking with him.

Hunk moved his right hand from Shiro’s ribs to the back of his head, petting his hair. “I’m serious. And I’m serious about this, too. I’ve got your back, man, and sometimes that means telling you no when you’re going down a road where you’re going because you think you need to go, not because you want to.” Shiro closed his eyes, hiding even a breath away. “And that you listen to my advice and trust me and my words—“ Hunk kept moving his fingers through Shiro’s hair, “it’s a privilege. I know exactly how lucky I am.”

Shiro opened his eyes at this, searching Hunk’s face for… something. Hunk waited, kept petting Shiro’s hair. It was thick and soft, softer where it had recently been clipped at his nape.

There were scars, there too under his fingers, and Hunk’s breath caught unexpectedly. It was a small miracle to be here. It was a small miracle for Shiro to be here. His heart felt a bit too full for a second, just like his head, thoughts zipping by before he could grasp them, and glad of it. Some thoughts were just too big, too overwhelming.

A phone made a buzzing noise, breaking the moment. Shiro opened his eyes, the faintest frown making a mark between his eyebrows.

Hunk pouted. “If that is any of our friends enquiring about the status of bets, I am going to toss that phone out of the window.”

It at least made Shiro smile.

They both moved to check their phones, sitting up, and for Shiro, putting his arm back. It was the affair of a few seconds, the membrane of the shoulder point touching the skin and wrapping tight with a ripple that looked like it should have made a sound, but did not. Putting it on already looked like a normal action to Shiro.

Hunk stopped staring and looked at his phone— nothing, nothing, a couple emails that could wait until the morning, as it was getting close to the local midnight. So it had been Shiro’s phone buzzing, and Hunk just raised his head to look at him as Shiro was getting up, grabbing the closest tee shirt and underwear. The tee shirt was Hunk’s.

“Sorry about that,” Shiro said, hair mussed from the shirt, and seeing him wear Hunk’s clothes did something good and funny to Hunk’s stomach. The more serious, tense face, the one he sported when he had to be Captain Shirogane, made the funny feeling go away all too fast. “Don’t wait up for me, it’s going to take a while.” Then Shiro moved to the indoor balcony, getting as much privacy as one could get in their room.

Hunk watched him go, watched his body language and the tone of his voice rather than listening to what was said. Three days. It had only taken three days for the job to come back to them. He got up, picked up the towel and bottle of lotion. When he came back from the bathroom after putting everything back and preparing for the night, Shiro was still talking, lit by the blue glare of the phone on one side, and the warm light of the lamp left on for the night on the other.

After ten minutes of poking at his phone, Hunk gave up on trying to stay awake, the warmth of hot springs, food, and prolonged skin contact clinging to his bones despite the interruption, and went to bed. Hearing the bass line of Shiro’s voice without understanding the words lulled him to sleep faster than he had thought possible.

He didn’t quite wake up when Shiro climbed into bed with him, just enough to make an affirmative noise at Shiro’s “Okay?” and wrap his arms around him.

+

“I could get used to that,” Hunk said, when Shiro moved to get up. It was early, probably the right kind of early for crazy people who went running as soon as they were awake. Hunk would never enjoy waking up that early, he was sure of it, but waking up because he and Shiro had slept half on top of each other and Shiro was moving? That he could enjoy.

“Sorry,” Shiro said, dropping a kiss on the corner of Hunk’s mouth, “Didn’t mean to wake you up.”

Hunk made a wordless protest and reached up to grab Shiro for a proper kiss. “There, better.” Only then did Hunk open his eyes. Shiro was still wearing his shirt. The funny feeling was back.

“Go back to sleep,” Shiro said. “I’m just going for a run.”

Hunk frowned at seeing his first thought being the right one. “You are crazy people.” He rolled back into the covers, Shiro laughing in the background.

“So,” he said a few hours later, sitting crosslegged across from Shiro and the breakfast spread, “Any plans for today?”

Shiro looked up from his tea. “Not really. There’s an old shrine deeper in the hills I remember going to for New Year’s, I was thinking of trying to find it again. Want to come with?”

Hunk smiled. “Yeah. And after that I can take you out to dinner, your pick. ‘I like long romantic walks in the woods and fine dining,’ how’s that for a date?”

Shiro laughed, the sound startled out of him. “You know my definition of fine dining is the Garrison’s mac and cheese.”

“I despair of your tastebuds,” Hunk sighed, “I really do.”

“And to actually answer your question: yes.”

The look they exchanged was warm. Hunk was half surprised, half not, at the steadiness of them. Yes, he felt like he was asking someone out for the first time, butterflies alive and well in his stomach, but at the same time, this was Shiro. This was the man who had been one of his instructors, one of his team leaders, one of his closest friends for years, one piece of the exclusive five part-being Voltron had been, another person who knew the shape of nightmares in the dark of space but also the brilliance of the stars, the never-ending beauty of the universe—this was the man who had been part of his life for so long it felt wrong to imagine it otherwise.

This was so much more than a crush.

They finished their breakfast in companionable silence.

+

Finding the shrine turned out to be a longer affair than Shiro had clearly expected. The lady at the inn’s reception area did not seem familiar with the description Shiro made —or at least that was the impression Hunk got. The digital maps that were brought out on phones and computers marked a lot more shrines than both Shiro and Hunk had expected. Hunk was ready to suggest visiting at least a couple, when another woman came in, the same one who had greeted them the first day. She seemed to know which place Shiro was looking for right away, and from what he half understood, the automated taxi could take them right to the trail that led there. 

There weren’t many vehicles on the road the taxi took. It was small and meandering, and going deeper into the hills, following the river. It was also gorgeous.

“Can I ask you a question?” Hunk asked, ten minutes into their ride. The little pop-up with their estimated time of arrival was announcing 15分—another quarter of an hour to go.

“Mm? Yes, of course,” Shiro said, turning away from looking outside.

“You weren’t sure of when you could give me an answer… so what changed?”

Shiro breathed, rubbed his mouth with his left hand, looked back to Hunk. “I went back to the cemetery. It put things in perspective.” He paused, before continuing: “We’re not at war anymore, and at the same time, with everything we have seen, everything we know, it’s hard to not think we’re still living on borrowed time. That… I’m still living on borrowed time. But waiting, waiting for what exactly?”

Their hands were next to each other on the seat, warm brown, cool grey.

“I didn’t want to miss a minute of who we could be.”

They were holding hands. Hunk took in the breath he had been unconsciously holding, cleared his throat. “Damn, warn a guy before springing something like that on him.” He was pretty sure his face was on fire.

And then, well, it was very pretty outside, but the scenery was not going anywhere, and they could make out like the teenagers they had been forced to stop being too soon if they wanted to. So they did.

+

In any other circumstances, Hunk thought he’d have driven past the stairs that led up to the shrine and completely missed it. There was barely enough space on the side of the road turned into a parking for the taxi to stay there and wait for them. The stairs themselves were indicated by a small sign and what was probably the name of the shrine on a plaque, leading right behind a copse of trees, and then up the hill. As soon as they stepped on the first stone step, it looked like they were out of time, somewhere else entirely, with only the sounds of the wind rustling leaves, insects, and birds.

“Whoa,” Hunk said. “This is amazing.”

Shiro looked at him and smiled. “I remember being less than happy when I last came here. My parents liked to go to this shrine for New Year’s. Imagine the stairs and everything covered in snow.”

“It must have been beautiful.”

“Yeah,” Shiro said, looking around like he was looking at something else, some _time_ else. “It really was.”

They made the climb in silence, breathing in the atmosphere. It was incredibly peaceful, in a way Hunk had rarely felt anywhere else—the canyons that were his parents’ home at night were like that, the one time he had gone to Tosua Trench as a kid, some times in the Yellow Lion when it had been just Hunk, the Lion, and the immensity of space, although that last one always had the undercurrent of the void waiting for him just beyond the hull.

Shiro stopped midway up the climb to take his phone out of his pocket. He frowned at the screen before looking back up at Hunk, three steps ahead. “Sorry, I’ll catch up to you—“ He was answering the call before Hunk could say anything, not that there was much to say. It was Captain Shirogane answering the call, Shiro’s spine straightening up like he was putting on a uniform, the tension in his shoulders coming back with a vengeance.

There was no point in waiting in the middle of the stairs, so Hunk finished the climb. The stairs opened on a rather small clearing, dominated by a tree whose trunk seemed as wide as one of the Lions. Hunk looked up at it in astonishment. The small building sitting in front of it, which he presumed was the shrine, was completely eclipsed by it.

He stayed in the middle of the clearing for a while. There were statues green with moss at each corner, and only a few traces that people came here regularly: little rectangles of wood on a sort of rack, the path free of debris and twigs, the shrine itself. Hunk had a brief moment of panic wondering if he should have brought any kind of offerings, but then thought that probably the lady at the inn would have mentioned it if it was absolutely necessary.

He went to look at the statues up close, the wood rack, then the shrine, then the tree. After that, he sat on the one stone bench that was just slightly off the clearing, and took it all in. He tried to imagine it in the winter, white with snow, the sounds muted by the thick cover. Had Shiro and his parents come in in kimono? Hunk tried to imagine Shiro as a child, mostly failed. He wondered if Shiro had pictures, if they were in the slightly dusty box his leather jacket had come from.

A bird started singing beyond the shrine. A minute or so later, it stopped, and Hunk saw Shiro taking the last few steps of the stairs and walk into the clearing. Shiro stopped just under the sort of portal before the first two statues, and Hunk figured he had probably made the same face Shiro was sporting now: looking up and up and up, the quiet reverence. Hunk wondered how different it looked from what Shiro remembered.

After a while, Shiro walked up to him.

“Sorry about that,” he said.

“It’s ok, man, hope everything got taken care of,” Hunk replied.

Shiro made a face. “We’ll see. I wouldn’t count on it for now.” He turned his head, looking at the shrine and the tree beyond. “I thought I was exaggerating the size of the tree in my memories because I was so much smaller then, but it’s really not.”

“It’s really not for sure.” Hunk looked up and up and up. “What do you think, that’s two lions or three?”

Shiro hummed. “Voltron would be about of height, I think.”

Hunk nodded. At the same time, he could feel something twisting his heart at the name of the collective he had been part of what felt yesterday and another life-time, at how casually Shiro seemed to be able to talk about it despite everything that had happened. Hunk reached out: Shiro was just in range that Hunk could take his hand. Shiro startled, dragged back from his contemplation. Whatever Hunk was feeling, it must have shown on his face, for Shiro squeezed back before sitting next to him.

“Allura would have liked this place,” Shiro said, and for an instant Hunk thought he misheard him. But he hadn’t, so he squeezed Shiro’s hand once more, hard. In those first few days after they had gotten Shiro back, those frantic, terrifying and at the same time mind-numbingly boring days, Allura and Keith had been the only people who could reach Shiro, who was half-aware at best when he was awake; Allura had explained it as Shiro’s mind and body meshing themselves together, which raised more questions and worries than it had soothed. Keith and Shiro had always been Keith-and-Shiro, somehow always on the same wavelength, and while Allura and Shiro had been close, it had never been to the same point. After they had gotten Shiro back, some days it had been as if Shiro and Allura had shared the same mind.

Hunk missed Allura everyday, the grief and guilt still sharp; he had no idea how Shiro felt about it. It was one of those things Hunk and the others hadn’t really talked about. Hunk and Lance had had their private discussions about it, but none of it could encompass everything Allura, and the gaping hole she had left in their lives. Hunk couldn’t help but think (and hated to think it at the same time, because it wasn’t Shiro’s fault) that if Shiro had been there with them in the Voltron bond all along, things wouldn’t have turned this way, with their friend gone: she’d have been there instead, with them, looking at an impossibly tall tree.

Hunk opened his mouth—he didn’t have words, but there had to be something that could be said, an apology, anything. Shiro squeezed his hand, not looking at him. “Don’t.” His smile was small, but it was there. “There’s not point in what ifs.” He moved his free hand over his heart. “I prefer to think that she’s still with us.”

Hunk swallowed, wondered for an instant if he’d need to clear his throat.

“In a sense, she is,” Shiro continued. “In that moment, when she carried me from the Black Lion to this body, there weren’t that much of a difference between what was me and what was her. She was… incredible.” Shiro’s voice trailed off, and he looked up, up, up to the tree. His right hand seemed to glow faintly, blue like the crystal from Allura’s tiara.

Hunk looked at him before moving his eyes to the tree. It seemed easier to talk about all those things they had never talked about here. And that was an answer, even if it was one Hunk wasn’t sure he had ever really wanted or needed, about Shiro and Allura’s relationship, after. But he was glad he knew, now.

In the last few days, they had had a lot of discussions Hunk wasn’t sure Shiro had ever had with anyone, even Keith. 

“I’m glad,” Hunk finally said, “that you told me. You’re a private person and I respect that— just, thank you for sharing it with me.”

“I’m sorry that I scared you guys, after… after.”

“Don’t you dare. I’m glad I know why only Allura and Keith could get more than a stare out of you back then, but you have nothing to apologize for.”

Shiro only smiled, a small, thin smile, looking down at their joined hands.

+

Shiro got another call in the automated taxi on their way back. They had stayed a bit longer at the shrine before taking the carefully maintained trail that looped around the area and going back down the stairs to the road.

They had walked all the way holding hands. They hadn’t talked more about Allura, or Voltron, or anything of importance. Shiro pointed at trees and plants whose names he remembered, and Hunk had taken many pictures, including a selfie of the two of them at the one viewpoint that looked over the valley and hills. Shiro had kissed him, then. It had been good. The tension in his shoulders that had come back with the call on the stairs had almost gone away during their walk.

In the automated taxi, the tension came back with a vengeance.

Hunk stayed quiet on his side of the seat and tried to not pay so much attention to what he could hear of the conversation. His status of former Paladin of Voltron gave him many advantages, as did his title of Atlas’ Chef and the unofficial position as something of a diplomat that came with it, but his security clearance wasn’t as high as it had been during the war. There were many things he was happy to leave to the people whose job it was to deal with things covered by high security clearances. And then there were people like Shiro, whose entire job was to deal with everything.

Shiro ended the call as they were coming in view of the town. He sighed, looked at Hunk.

“Sorry. It looks like our dinner date will have to wait, I have to be on a four-way conference call as soon as we hit the inn.”

“I’m sorry you didn’t get to have more time off.”

Shiro grimaced. “It’s already kind of a minor miracle I had most of 3 days free.”

“You deserve a lot more,” Hunk said. “I’ll keep the taxi and go into town then. Do you have an idea how long that will take?”

Shiro sighed, leaned his head against the window side as the taxi stopped in front of the inn. “Too long.”

Before Shiro exited, Hunk grabbed his wrist. “Just call me or leave me a message when you’re good, yeah?”

Shiro moved his hand so that he could squeeze Hunk’s wrist back, and nodded. Then he was gone, back straight, and Hunk did not wait to see him enter the inn before he poked at the navigational map on the taxi’s window and scheduled to be dropped right in the middle of town.

It was about mid-day when he got there. Hunk wandered for a bit, before deciding to buy something to eat he could carry around, then walking to the harbor. He found a bench there, and just enjoyed the moment while finishing his food. Later he answered messages, commented on pictures. Lance was still on Nabooine, and it was the middle of the night for him, so Hunk just sent him a quick hello.

A boat left. Hunk caught himself thinking about a lot of things. Earth, and living there, and the choice he had made to be the head chef on the lead ship of the Coalition and living nowhere—about the past, and the present, and the future. Would he always live and work on the Atlas? He caught himself thinking about unfinished degrees, not that there was much of a point to them, with how many changes Earth had seen since the invasion—with how many changes he had gone through during that time. He wasn’t thirty yet, he had all the time in front of him and no time at all: he could have died a thousand times and he could die tomorrow.

He wondered if that was what Shiro thought about, had been thinking about, that night in the observation lounge. It was a lot, almost too much.

He left a message to his parents with a nice picture of the harbor, then go up to wander some more.

+

“You got me cake.”

“I got us cake,” Hunk corrected, still presenting the small box with one hand to Shiro. “Really nice patisserie, the owner spoke english and gave me a fascinating history lesson on japanese pastries. Did you know there’s an entire area of it that is very strongly influenced by French patisserie? Very cool, super pretty cakes.”

It was late afternoon by the time Shiro had given the all clear. Hunk had come back to find Shiro sitting in the indoor balcony, looking outside, and looking tired. So Hunk had walked to him and thrusted the striped cardboard box under his nose.

Shiro smiled. He took the box delicately. “We should ask if we can get tea up to go with it, then. Thank you, Hunk.”

“I know it doesn’t replace a date-date, but correct me if I’m wrong, you look kinda rough and like you’d rather stay in.”

Shiro passed his free hand in his hair. “I could go for a drive at full throttle. Or the asteroid simulation at level 45.”

“Oh, the one with the hollow planetoid?”

“Yeah,” Shiro chuckled. “And the optional enemy fighters.”

“Optional my ass, I never lasted more than 30 seconds at that level.” They both smiled over sharing the memories of the flight and fight simulators at the Garrison. Hunk didn’t really miss it—flying had been fine, and honestly he did well with it and so did his stomach as long as he was the one with the hands on the controls, but his true area of expertise and interest had been engineering.

Shiro sighed, looked down at the box in his hands. “Anything having to do with dealing with people in public wouldn’t be much fun.” He paused for a moment. Hunk took the opportunity to take his jacket off. “I have to go back to the Atlas tomorrow.”

“Ah man,” Hunk said. “I’m sorry you didn’t get more time. What time is the flight? Or did you not look yet?”

Shiro got up. He walked to the small table in the middle of the room, put the box on it. “0700 at the jumpers here, then 1000 from Tokyo. Arrival at…well, today, not that it makes much of a difference.”

“I know I shouldn’t ask much, but everything all right?”

Shiro didn’t answer immediately. He ordered tea from the front desk, and after asking Hunk with a quirked eyebrow and a couple raised fingers, ordered dinner for the both of them for a couple hours later. Then, and only then, he sat at the table, facing Hunk. “A lot of posturing, a lot of people not wanting to talk to anyone but the highest ranked person in charge,” he gestured at himself with a humorless smile, “same old, same old.”

“Well it sucks.” Hunk took Shiro’s hand, the flesh one, between his. “Baths after the tea?”

“Sounds good.”

“I wish we could bring the hot springs with us, by the way. It’s great. Why don’t we have communal areas like that on the Atlas? I know it wasn’t built by a culture that view that as a social activity much, but after the second retrofit and the influx of different sentients and cultures, that could have been possible, no?”

Shiro hummed, his thumb rubbing across Hunk’s knuckles. “You could have a word about it to Slav. And get the whole lecture about green sock universe or whatever he’ll go on about.”

Hunk chuckled. “Still not a fan of his, huh.” He chuckled harder at the aggravated noise Shiro made in answer.

Silence settled between them; the well-worn, comfortable kind. They had spent many hours like that on the Castle of Lion, deep in the sleep cycle, when neither of them could sleep from anxiety or looming nightmares.

Shiro closed his eyes. “I had missed this. Not why we did it. But just…”

“… being, and being not alone?”

“Yeah.”

Once more, it struck Hunk how isolated Shiro seemed to be. “Hey,” Hunk said, squeezing Shiro’s hand. “My door is always open. I mean it.”

Before Shiro could answer, there was a knock at the door—the tea, for the cake that that been forgotten on the table.

+

“So, what time do we need to be up tomorrow?” Hunk asked, up to his chin in hot water.

Shiro, seated next to him, sighed. “You don’t have to cut your vacation short too.”

Hunk nudged him with his elbow. “I don’t have to but I want to. Someone has to check on my kitchen, it might have caught on fire again.”

“‘Again’?” Shiro asked. “Do I even want to know?”

“Hazard of the job and the myriad of smoke points for the oils of the universe—also why we’ve stopped doing the fried crawfish-like insects that we could raise onboard. Delicious, but a bad idea.” At Shiro’s raised eyebrow, he elaborated: “highly flammable exoskeletons. On their planet of origin, they’re eaten raw, but most of our crew can’t process them that way.”

Shiro made a soft noise—assent and wonder all rolled up into one. “I’m serious, you know,” he said, after a little while. “Don’t go back to the Atlas just because I have to.”

Hunk hummed. It felt like the heat had gone all the way to his bones, just about the point where he was ready to get out and continue their last evening with dinner back in their room, and sleeping in the same bed again. Tomorrow, they’d go back to the Atlas, and probably deal with a fair spot of gentle teasing. Shiro would go to his meetings, and Hunk would check on his kitchen and use his remaining time off to see his parents, unless the Atlas needed to get out there. 

There was a date they still had not gotten, and quiet talks about boundaries in the place they both lived in and worked at to have, and more kissing, possibly with more coming after. But for now, here they were: still with time for themselves, naked in the hot baths of a Japanese inn, the closest they had ever been without the otherworldly intelligence and presence of the Lions to meld them into one. So Hunk got up, and held his hand out to Shiro: “I’m going exactly where I want to.”

  
  
  
  



End file.
